Pro v2.1 with AJAX marker edit support & more is available

Published on 20. February 2015

It all started with a tutorial about adding AJAX functionality to plugins by Pippin Williams. I thought “hey – that would really be a great addition to Maps Marker Pro”, especially as reloading of the whole page after marker edits always annoyed me a lot. The tutorial was easy to understand and a few hours later I already had a working prototype. But – as often – the devil was in the details and this is why the development of this version took longer than planned. Nevertheless, now I am happy to announce that v2.1 with support for AJAX for marker edits on backend is finally available 🙂

By adding AJAX to the marker edit page on backend, I also had to look through to a lot of old code I hadn´t optimized since a long time – this is why v2.1 has the longest changelog ever. Many changes and fixes are very subtle but no less important for the overall smooth user experience.

I would also like to thank all users giving me feedback about issues or potential for optimizations – this really helped improving Maps Marker Pro a lot!

Let me know what you think about this new release by submitting a review or leaving a comment below!

If you want to keep up to date with the latest Maps Marker development, please follow @MapsMarker on twitter (= most current updates), on Facebook, Google+ or subscribe to news via RSS or via RSS/email.

optimized editing workflow for marker maps – no more reloads needed due to AJAX support

AJAX is a technology which for example enables database edits without having you to reload the page. As a first step, I added AJAX functionality to the marker edit page on backend. So each time you add a new marker or update an existing marker, your changes are immediately saved to the database without having to reload the whole page.

Screenshot 1 – loading indicator:

Screenshot 2 – status bar on top:

Initially I also planned to add AJAX support for layer edits on backend with v2.1 too – but as this would have led to further delays, I decided to add AJAX support for layer edits in a future release.

update Mapbox integration to API v4

Since January 2015 Mapbox.com requires new users to use their API v4, which means that a custom API access token is needed if you want to display custom Mapbox basemaps.

Mapbox accounts created before January 2015 will currently continue to work (even with the free version) – anyway in the long run it might be possible that Mapbox decides to discontinue API v3 support for existing users too, so an update to API v4 is highly recommended!

support for parsing shortcodes in popuptexts on layer maps

Before v2.1, default WordPress shortcodes or shortcodes from other plugins added to popuptexts were only displayed correctly on marker maps. Thanks to feedback from caneblu I now found a way to support this functionality also on layer maps – thanks a lot!

enhance duplicate markers-bulk action

The bulk actions-section for markers has also been improved thanks to feedback from Fran: with v2.1 it is now also possible to duplicate multiple markers on the “list of markers” page and re-assign the new markers to a different layer within one step:

Please note that translators are also compensated for their contribution – for example if a translation is finished less than 50%, the translator gets a free 25 licenses pack worth €149 as a compensation for completing the translation to 100%.

Outlook – my plans for the next releases

Please understand that I am not being able to promise any release dates for new features. The roadmap for major new features gives you an idea where Maps Marker Pro is heading – anyway I just would want to keep the flexibility to add optimizations and bugfixes with rather unplanned minor releases resulting mostly from users feedback.

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Full changelog

optimized editing workflow for marker maps – no more reloads needed due to AJAX support

support for parsing shortcodes in popuptexts on layer maps (thx caneblu!)

The easiest way to update is to use the WordPress update process: login with an user who has admin privileges, navigate to Dashboard / Updates, select plugins to update and press the button “Update Plugins”. The pro plugin checks every 12 hours if a new version is available. You can also manually trigger the update check by going to Plugins and clicking on the link “Manually check for updates” next to “Maps Marker Pro”:

If you do not see the link “Check for updates” and are using a version below 1.7, please update manually once by downloading the current package from https://www.mapsmarker.com/download-pro and overwritting the existing plugin files on your server via FTP. This might be needed on several hosts, which use outdated SSL libraries, which prevent Maps Marker Pro from making a secure connection to retrieve the update package from mapsmarker.com. Pro v1.7 includes a workaround for those kind of servers and the following updates should work again as usual. If you are affected and need help, please open a support ticket.

Share your favorite spots and tracks with Maps Marker Pro, the most comprehensive geo-content management system for WordPress with a moral code. We never store your geolocation data and keep up with latest security standards. Start plotting right away and customize a multitude of features as you go. Happy mapping!